


Flock Together

by PokeChan



Category: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Adoption, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Canon-Typical Violence, Domestic, Established Relationship, Found Family, Gen, M/M, Murder Family, basically a domestic!AU with bonus murder monsters, monster!Kurogane, monster!Sakura, off screen murders, tags and characters to be added as relevant
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-20
Updated: 2016-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-15 04:25:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5771251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PokeChan/pseuds/PokeChan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fai has always been a bit of a nosy busybody. In fact, he'd decided to make a career out of it by becoming a journalist, a choice that would change the course of not only his life, but his entire world view.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Birds of a Feather

**Author's Note:**

> I've been batting this idea around of ages now and tweaking the universe to make it work better. I'm not 100% there yet but the first few chapters are mostly set up anyway. It's basically a domestic AU with bonus murder demons. So you know, if that tickles your fancy.

“You’re so lucky, Fai-chan! Not only did you find yourself a well off man, but he’s so handsome too!” Hokuto whispered to Fai, her arm around his shoulders. He wasn’t sure why she was whispering, they were in the back room and Kurogane was all the way up front in the store proper.

Fai laughed and poked Hokuto playfully in the side. “I’m not dating him for his money, you know,” he said.

Kurogane and Fai had been dating long before Fai knew the first thing about the man’s bank account. They’d been set up on a blind date by a mutual friend and something had stuck. Back then Fai had been waiting tables and chasing his tail trying to make a name for himself as a journalist. Kurogane had been the only break in his life, the single shining star in an otherwise bleak sky. Fai wished he wasn’t being dramatic, but back then not a single thing had gone right for him.

That was then, though, and now he and Kurogane were living together in a whole new city. Fai didn’t need to work, Kurogane’s job was plenty to pay all of their bills, but Fai was never the stay at home type, too much energy, too nosy to keep the world locked outside. He’d found himself a part time job at some little bistro just off of Main Street, he kept the apartment clean, and his boyfriend was the finest thing this side of the Pacific. Fai’s life had finally turned around.

There was just one teeny, tiny, little hiccup.

“Oi, are you gonna give me back my boyfriend, squirt, or do I have to come back there?” Kurogane’s voice carried easily to the back room and Fai slipped free of Hokuto’s friendly hold with ease.

“Coming Kuro-darling!” he sang. “I’ll see you Sunday!” Fai said, waving farewell to Hokuto and pointedly _not_ hurdling the counter and leaping straight into Kurogane’s arms.

Back before, when Fai’s life had looked like a proverbial train wreck, he’d been doing everything he could to make a name for himself. He’d gone to school for Journalism, he’d done all of his internships, had a resume that wasn’t entirely skeletal, and was charming (in his honest opinion), but not a single newspaper or magazine or online gossip column had wanted to hire him. So, Fai had been forced to try and find a story on his own that would be big enough to get his less than impressive blog noticed and jumpstart his career.

The biggest scoop at the time had been a string of gruesome murders. There were never any clues, no evidence left, only the mangled, bloody corpses the victims. There was no pattern to the kills -- time, date, victims; nothing had matched up. The only thing that remained the same was that there were always multiple victims found at once, and that the murders had been violent. Extremely so.

The police had begun calling the killer the Silver Dragon.

If Fai had been smart he would have stayed as far away from such a thing as he could. Sure, he had self defense training, he owned a taser and a can of mace, but for his six feet of height he knew he was scrawny and honestly, not all that brave. Fai, however, was either a huge idiot or had not a shred of self preservation in him, because he had stuck his nose in everything and anything that could have lead him to this mysterious Dragon.

“You know,” Fai cooed, slipping his hand into Kurogane’s and tucking himself into his side. “You don’t have to pick me up and walk me home. I’m a big boy.”

Kurogane snorted and pulled Fai even closer. “You’re a trouble magnet is what you are.”

“But I’m a cute trouble magnet, right?” Fai teased as they made their way onto the street. Summer had ended and the wind was cool enough to have him wishing he’d brought more than an old sweatshirt.

“Don’t push it,” Kurogane said, the banter familiar and playful.

In the end, Fai had found the Silver Dragon. It had been an accident, a perfect case of wrong place, wrong time. It had changed his life. It hadn’t been anything Fai had been expecting, or even something that Fai had thought possible. He, in all of his foolishness, had been searching for a murderer and instead had found so much more. He’d discovered demons and spirits and all manner of otherworldly things. He’d found a completely new layer of terror to lay over top his already horrifying world view. 

He’d also found a love deeper than he knew what to do with.

“Are you going out tonight?” Fai asked. It’d been close to a week, and Kurogane didn’t like to push it.

“I should be fine for another few days,” he said, leaning a bit closer to Fai. “Especially if you’re willing to keep me busy.”

Fai leaned up and captured Kurogane’s mouth in a kiss, nipping sharply at his lips as an answer. He still didn’t like that Kurogane had to go out a few times a month, and he preferred to not think about it at all. He _knew_ what Kurogane was doing, but it didn’t get brought up or spoken about outside of Kurogane telling Fai he’d be late coming home. It wasn’t as if Kurogane had a choice, and Fai understood that. Still, he didn’t have to like it.

Kurogane hung a left, pulling Fai along with him, and continued down the street leading away from their apartment. Fai might not have been paying much attention to where they’d been going, but he did know how to get back home. He eyed Kurogane suspiciously. When after a full block he failed to receive some sort of explanation or guess something himself (their anniversary was a few months off, his birthday was well behind them, and the pet store for that cat he’d been wanting was on the other side of town) he tugged a little at his arm. “I know you had a long day at work but you do realize we’re going the wrong way, right?”

“We’re heading over to the old rail yard. Our company still owns it even though it’s abandoned and there have been reports of people poking around in it,” Kurogane said. “My manager asked if I could go and see if it looks like kids have been vandalizing anything and if so she’s going to put in a police report.”

“Ahh, so we’re hunting delinquents are we?” Fai laughed. 

If it were anyone else Fai would make jokes about what an odd date this was to take him on, and how unromantic of partner he was, but this wasn’t just anyone, it was Kurogane. They were both acutely aware of how concerned Fai got if Kurogane was late coming home without texting before hand, and even then Fai always got a bit twitchy when Kurogane went out on nights he hadn’t planned ahead of time.

There were plenty of good reasons for this. To anyone else Fai might seem like a neurotic, controlling boyfriend, but the life Kurogane led, especially in secret, was dangerous. To both of them sometimes. It was best that Fai be with him and know where he was and what he was doing when he could.

The railyard sat a few blocks from Main Street, rusting away among other decrepit warehouses and squatter apartments. The wire fence surrounding the area was a solid ten feet tall, topped with nasty looking barbed wire that not even Fai, in his reckless and impulsive youth, would have challenged. Beyond the fence a handful of rundown, useless train cars sat, eroding away and forgotten on the now useless tracks. 

Together they made their way up to the closed gates, a heavy padlock the size of Fai’s fist was hanging from a thick chain woven between the metal bars of the gate. “I don’t think this thing would open even if you had the key,” he said, jiggling the chains a bit. “Sturdy though.”

“Cut that out,” Kurogane snapped and the urgency in his voice was enough to keep Fai from rattling the chain harder and cracking a joke. “Look.”

Fai stepped up next to Kurogane and followed his line of sight to what looked like an old cable van parked between two of the rusty train cars. At first glance Fai would have thought it was just another hunk of metal left there to waste space, but upon a more careful look the tires seemed new and there were definitely tracks. The van had been driven recently. 

“How do you think they got in?” Fai asked.

“Don’t know. There’s probably a section of fence cut out that they drive through and refasten so no one notices. We’ll let the cops figure it out.” 

And wasn’t Fai glad to hear it. He didn’t know if it was a bunch of rowdy teens looking for simple thrills or something worse, but the less involved he and Kurogane were the better. The last thing they needed was the cops snooping around their lives, especially if Kurogane was going to have to go out soon.

They hadn’t gotten two steps away when Fai heard the faint wails of a child coming from inside one of the hangers.

“Do you hear that?” Fai asked, already turned around and pressing an ear against the fence. “It sounds like a little kid!”

He heard Kurogane curse under his breath. “I knew there were people in there.”

As long as Fai had known him Kurogane had always been very good at knowing if there were people around him. At first Fai had just thought it was a bunch of lucky guessing and paying too much attention to things around him, after he’d learned the truth, well. 

“Why didn’t you say something? Hurry up, we have to get in there, they’re hurting a little kid!” Fai said. He didn’t know how they’d get in but Kurogane managed plenty of getting into places he had no business being, and if pressed Fai was more than capable himself. He hoped Kurogane had been given keys or something useful by his manager.

Without a word, Kurogane scooped Fai up into his arms and dashed along the fence until they were out of view of the street. Fai looped his arms around Kurogane’s neck and held tight. He was never really going to get used to the bursts of inhuman strength and speed Kurogane showed. For the good of both of them it was a rare occurrence, but even if it were an everyday thing Fai felt as if it would still send him reeling for a second or two. 

They landed silently on the other side of the fence, Kurogane’s jump clearing even the barbed wire effortlessly and his landing disturbed not a pebble of the gravel that littered the rail yard. He set Fai on his feet carefully and motioned for him to stay quiet and follow after him. 

As they drew closer they could hear what was very clearly a man shouting something Fai couldn’t quite make out while a small voice wailed in fear. There was a sudden crescendo to the noise and a ruckus before everything went silent for a moment. Fai and Kurogane both froze. They had enough time to share a puzzled look before the silence ended and the piercing shrieks of a child were heard again, louder and more frantic than earlier.

Throwing caution to the wind Fai ran into the warehouse, Kurogane cursing and at his heels. What they found he wished he had never seen. 

A little girl who couldn’t have been older than five or six dressed only in a filthy nightgown stood crying over a man, sprawled out on the ground and very much not moving. In the little girl’s hands was a crowbar and both she and it were covered in blood.

“Oh dear god,” Fai said, the words leaving him on a gasp. 

“Ahh, shit,” Kurogane added, sounding far less horrified and much more exasperated. 

The little girl finally seemed to notice them through her tears and startled with a squeak that jolted her body enough to unbalance her and send her tumbling down onto her rear. Her green eyes were wide and frantic as she tried to scramble backwards away from them while still clutching on to her crowbar. She hadn’t stopped crying and the tear tracks on her cheeks were clear, cutting through the grime and blood on her face. 

Fai took a few slow steps towards her, keeping his hands in front of him and trying for a comforting smile. When he was just out of arm’s reach of her he knelt down and held out his hand. “It’s okay,” he said gently. “We’re here to help you. We don’t wanna hurt you like that man.”

Behind him Kurogane hadn’t moved. “Were there others?” he asked and Fai was thankful he didn’t bark out the question and kept his voice low and nonthreatening. The little girl glanced up at Kurogane quickly before refocusing on Fai, who kept smiling. Then, she nodded and Fai felt ice drop into his veins. “Do you know where they went?”

She shook her head. Fai didn’t like this. He threw a meaningful frown back at Kurogane. They needed to get this girl out of here. 

“What were they going to do with you?” Kurogane asked, this time he sounded angry.

The girl swallowed, her whole head bobbing with the motion. “Th-they said someone was gonna b-buy me.”

Fai was not a man quick to anger but in an instant he was seeing red and the rumbling growl he heard from Kurogane told him he was feeling much the same way. Selling a child! What sort of heartless, soulless monsters were they dealing with here? “Where is your family, sweetheart?” Fai asked.

The girl’s lip began to wibble and she curled in on herself before she started bawling again. “G-gone!” and it was the most heartbreaking sound Fai had ever heard.

“Hey, hey,” Fai said, scooting closer to the poor child. She didn’t put up a fight when he gathered her up in his arm and eased the crowbar out of her small, pudgy hands, handing it over to Kurogane who had finally moved closer. “You’re okay, you’re gonna be okay.”

He had no way of making her okay or fixing anything, but the weeping little girl in his arms didn’t need to know that. She needed comfort and safety and Fai was going to do what he could to give her that much, even if it was only a bunch of pretty words. 

One of Kurogane’s hands came up and brushed some of the hair out of her face, his large hands bigger than her whole face. He watched her over Fai’s shoulder for a few moments and then something in the air shifted. Fai held his breath and willed whatever was about to happen to not, but much like the rest of his life, things did not go his way.

“Fai,” Kurogane said slowly. They both knew Fai wasn’t going to like what came next. “Do you remember what I told you about how things like me came to be?”

He couldn’t breathe and he held the little girl closer to his chest, like he could shield her from reality. He nodded.

“Give her to me.”

Fai pulled away suddenly, took a handful of steps back and away from Kurogane. “No! She’s just a baby, look at her! Kuro-sama, she’s just a little girl!”

For his part Kurogane did look sorry. “Exactly, she’s young, very young. You know we have no control over this, Fai, now give her here.”

“No,” Fai said weakly, shaking his head, but even as Kurogane took slow, measured steps towards them Fai found he couldn’t move his legs. In his arms the little girl was still, sniffling quietly into his shirt. “Kurogane please, no.”

“It’s not up to me, you know that.” Kurogane’s hands were warm as he pried Fai’s arms open and lifted the girl out of them easily. He held her with one arm and lifted her chin with his other hand, leaving Fai standing beside him, trembling and useless. Even from the odd angle Fai could see how her pupils had begun to narrow and the subtle glow the green of her eyes was taking.

Blood spilled by young hands created monsters, violence the trigger to a deep, otherworldly survival reflex that changed humans into something more. It made them strong, fast, gave them amazingly keen senses and turned them into a thing of nightmares so that they might no longer be afraid. Blood on young hands made claws sprout. Kurogane was living proof of this and now this poor girl shared the same fate. 

Kurogane had been alone, he’d told Fai. He’d had no teachers and by the time he’d found another of his kind he’d been nearly an adult. Fai would not let this child go through the same hardships and the way Kurogane tucked a few flyaway strands behind her ear neither would he. 

“Alright, princess, do you know if those men plan on coming back soon?” She nodded and the grin that slashed its way across Kurogane’s face held no mirth and chilled Fai to his bones.

It was all over terrifyingly fast after that. Kurogane had had enough time to stash Fai away in a dark corner before the sound of tires on gravel drained the color from what he could see of the small girl’s face. Kurogane took her with him and Fai turned his back on the carnage that ensued. He screwed his eyes shut and curled in on himself and told himself that every one of those men deserved to die, for that little girl was not their first, but she would be their last.

There was screaming, bones broke and they begged for their lives. 

The girl recognized the man who had slain her older brother, Fai heard her tell Kurogane. And then Fai heard Kurogane instruct her, he heard Kurogane teach her how to feed like he fed. One by one the broken, pleading voices died out and Fai told himself they deserved it. He didn’t have a hard time believing it.

When Kurogane came to get him Fai did not feel for the mangled corpses on the warehouse floor. He only spared them a passing glance before he focused on two pairs of glowing, inhuman eyes, red and green, familiar and new.


	2. Nice to Meet You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fai's life was a dim dead end and Kurogane was the light at the end of the tunnel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully the format I have planned for this fic won't be too confusing. This is a Past Chapter, which dedals with Kurogane and Fai before finding Sakura.

Most people hated Mondays, which Fai guessed was fair enough. Mondays were the beginning of the traditional work week, they were the first day of school, they signalled the end of the weekend, the word didn’t even sound pleasant. There were plenty of reasons for people not to like Mondays, Fai didn’t argue that, but the day he hated most was Friday. 

Specifically Friday nights, where people went out late to wind down from the week and let off steam. Except letting off steam usually meant making Fai’s life a living hell. Whether it was rowdy college age kids too young still to go haunt a bar or crabby middle aged nobodies who hated their dead end jobs and wanted to take it out on the world, Fai had to deal with both and everything in between while he waited tables with a thin smile and a charming voice.

Weekdays were easy, they got a steady flow for lunch and dinner, the people were usually pretty mellow and had better things to do than loiter at his tables drinking a third cup of coffee and gumming up the flow of patrons. Weekends were fun, everyone had had all day to relax and it was time for laughter and merriment, even the Sunday crowd with their looming Monday morning were cheerier and easier to deal with than Friday nights. 

Fai all but kicked the door open and slammed his tray down on the counter and valiantly resisted the urge to scream and walk back into the floor with a hot frying pan to knock some manners into his latest table. “That’s the third time tonight!” he hissed to no one in particular. 

Three tables had stiffed him a tip -- well, technically only two had flat out stiffed him, but a buck and some pocket change did not a tip make on a bill over fifty dollars -- and even after this latest table had been so damn _friendly_ while he’d run to and fro making sure their meal was perfect. He’d taken special orders for each person in the party of ten and had carefully made sure no one’s drink had run dry. He could not have been a better waiter if he’d prechewed their food for them and what did he have to show for all his hard work? A leaflet on the love of Jesus Christ and an officially blown fuse. 

“They didn’t leave you anything?” Chii asked, brow furrowed. She’d followed him into the kitchen and Fai wasn’t sure if he was thankful or not for her concern. 

Fai counted down from five so he didn’t snap at Chii, she of all people didn’t deserve his temper. He didn’t quite manage to keep all the venom out of his voice as he threw the leaflet down on his abused tray with disgust. “Oh, they left me something.”

Chii winced and picked it up with two dainty fingers. “Leaving nothing would have been kinder.”

“You should shove that up their pretentious asses,” Fuuma, one of the line cooks, said setting two plates laden with Fai’s last table’s orders. “That is just insulting.”

“Doesn’t do me a scrap of good either,” Fai muttered grabbed the plates. “With the mess my life is I doubt even God Himself could help me out.”

Fuuma laughed and gave Fai a sympathetic look. “The way your luck goes my guess would be it’s the big man to blame.” By Fai’s wager he probably wasn’t wrong. “Hey,” Fuuma called as Fai lifted his tray. “Hang back after your shift, I think I know a way to bring a little sunshine to your rainy parade.”

Fai doubted it and he knew the look he gave Fuuma said as much, but he agreed and headed back out to his table. It wasn’t as if he had anything else to do and there was no one waiting for him back at his one bedroom apartment, not even so much as a goldfish or a potted plant. Fai didn’t really have anything to lose.

One would think that being four years out of college with a bachelor’s degree in journalism Fai would have a job that amounted to more than waiting tables and being screamed at by anyone who walked though the restaurant’s doors. He didn’t though. He had no jobs, no prospects. All he had was a load of student debt, an unimpressive resume, a meaningless, amature blog, and what was once a dream to be a big city reporter for the ten ‘o'clock news. He’d busted his ass for four years only to find out that the real world didn’t give a damn about his 3.7 GPA.

It was all about who you knew, not what. And Fai didn’t know anyone.

He found Fuuma smoking out behind the restaurant where all the staff took their allotted breaks. Fai’s eyes tracked the curl of smoke as it lifted lazily from the fiery red tip of Fuuma’s cigarette and vanished slowly into the warm midsummer air.

“Not gonna tell me this is bad for my health?” Fuuma asked as he took a final drag and dropped the butt to the ground, extinguishing it with his sneaker.

Fai shrugged. “You’re old enough to know better.”

That got him a quiet laugh and a smile that managed to look friendly and condescending at the same time. 

“So, what kind of guys are you in to?”

If nothing else could be said of Fuuma the guy sure knew how to keep a conversation on its toes. “What?”

Fuuma shrugged. “I’ve got a friend and he’s been single for a while now, but I finally got him to agree to go out on a date if I found someone for him and I think you two would make quite a pair.”

For a few seconds all Fai could do was blink incredulously. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah!” Fuuma said practically beaming. “He’s a good guy, a bit rough around the edges, but he’s honest and he doesn’t play games. I think you’d like him, at the very least as a friend, and I know for a fact you could do with a few more of those. Though I can’t see anyone with a pulse passing up on a chance to grab at an ass like his.”

Fai put his face in his hands. “Oh my god, _Fuuma_!”

His cheeks were warm and, as poorly as Fuuma had pitched the idea, a date was an enticing idea. Fai hadn’t dated since he’d first graduated, and that hadn’t lasted very long at all. Maybe this was what he needed, to get out and have some fun, even if it was only for dinner.

“What do you say?” Fuuma asked, grinning like he could read Fai’s mind (and really Fai wouldn’t be too surprised if he ever found out Fuuma _could_ read minds).

And that was how Fai met Kurogane, who was unimpressive on their first date but adorably flustered on their third and by their fifth seemed to be everything Fai had never knew he wanted in a man. 

Kurogane was impatient and moody to put it mildly, but he was funny and attentive and listened when Fai spoke. It didn’t hurt that he was drop dead beautiful with impossibly gorgeous eyes and arms that looked like they could have stood in as tree trunks. He never made Fai feel bad about himself even though he teased. He took Fai’s jokes with a grumble and a playful swat and a poorly hidden smile with each nickname Fai made up for him. He asked about Fai’s degree and his goals, texted him about how his day was going, and even managed to use a heart emoji on a goodnight text after two months of dating. 

Their first kiss was clumsy, noses bumping and heads knocking. The fall weather was unseasonably cold and they were outside and Fai’s nose was running and Kurogane’s teeth were chattering. Fai almost slipped off his stoop and nearly knocked them both to the ground. All in all, it was perfect.

Their first time was desperate and on Kurogane’s couch. It was quick and inelegant and _so good_. Their second time was that same night and it was slower and just as good but in a different way.

Fai said “I love you” first and Kurogane said it back in a heartbeat.

More than a year later Fai was still waiting tables but he had someone waiting for him when he clocked out. He had a hand to hold and a mouth to kiss and someone who loved him. Fuuma had been horribly smug for weeks but Fai didn’t care. He was in love and he was happier than he could remember being in his life. 

Still, Fai had dreams and he was not about to give up on them. If anything, thanks to Kurogane, he was more determined than ever to make a name for himself. Kurogane was a successful engineer even though he was two years Fai’s junior and about as charismatic as a cactus (Fai loved this man but he was devoid of anything resembling genteelness to the point of embarrassment). 

“Man, I wish they’d play something less depressing,” Fuuma said into his beer eyeing the bar television disdainfully. There was a news report on about the resident serial killer, creatively dubbed the Silver Dragon, and the latest murders, or rather about how the trail had just gone cold yet again on the latest murders. “That’s not what I wanna drink to.”

Fai had to agree. It had been three years since the Dragon had started killing and the police were no closer to catching them than they had been the first time a quartet of mangled, broken bodies had been found. Unless the serious looking man on the screen was telling them the Silver Dragon had been caught and brought to justice via execution Fai wanted to hear none of it. At least not while he was trying to have a nice time with friends.

The thick manila folder sitting on his desk at home was for when he was busy playing field journalist. 

“I still can’t believe it’s a person doing this,” Oruha frowned from her side of the bar before picking up the remote and clicking over to some ball game. “They still aren’t sure if it’s one person or a group, are they?”

Fai emptied his glass. “Leading theory is one very dedicated lunatic, but they haven’t written off the idea of the Silver Dragon actually being Dragons.”

Fuuma raised an eyebrow. “Knowledgeable, aren’t we?”

“I’m a journalist,” Fai said with a wink.

“Journalist by trade, busybody by habit,” Kurogane said with a huff. “You’re too nosy for your own good.”

Fai and Kurogane had had this conversation before. The first time or two Kurogane had had good reason to worry, Fai had been overzealous and had meant to catch the Silver Dragon himself. He’d spent hours looking for a pattern in attacks, trying to guess when and where they’d strike next. Kurogane had understandably gotten worried and after a few heated arguments Fai had agreed to back off and quit trying to track down the serial killer. 

What he hadn’t agreed to was to drop the project altogether, and weeks later it was still a subject of contention. Fai was still set on finding a pattern or connection of some sort. He was sure there had to be something everyone was over looking. There was always some sort of common factor, Fai just had to find out what.

“Still on the hunt?”

“No,” Fai said, rolling his eyes at Fuuma and Kurogane both. “But I’m still looking into things. I just need one little scoop though, something, _anything_. This could be my big break.”

“Or you could get yourself killed,” Kurogane said, face sour. “Can’t you research something less deadly than a local serial killer? Like swine flu or spitting cobras?”

“Oh, ha ha, Kuro-pon,” Fai said. “It’s not like I’m dipping into back alleys and asking random bums if they’ve seen any gruesome murders lately. It’s book work, connecting dots and making charts.”

Which wasn’t entirely true and they both knew it. Fai had been poking around old crime scenes, the ones whose trails had gone cold months or even years ago. In Fai’s opinion he wasn’t in danger, looking for clues in the distant past, but in Kurogane’s eyes he might as well be wearing a target on his back and hollering “please kill me” in the middle of an abandoned saw mill in a B-list horror movie. It was touching that he cared like he did, but Fai had a job to do, even if no one was paying or thanking him for trying to do it. 

Snarling, Kurogane slammed his empty bottle on the counter, earning a contrite glare from Oruha. “Whatever, I’m not doing this here,” he said, standing and tossing down a few bills and pulling on his coat. “Text me when you get home, I’ll be working late this week, I’ll see you next weekend. Don’t do anything stupid.”

And with that Kurogane stormed out of the bar. 

Oruha let out a low whistle and shook her head. “That boy of yours sure has a temper, sweetie.” Fai sighed and leaned his head in the bar. He hated fighting with Kurogane, but he couldn’t let himself be frightened away either. He was scared every time he went out to ask questions, but he pushed on, he had to. He had a taser and mace and a black belt. He wasn’t helpless. “You know, he’s just worried about you.”

“I know, but that’s not enough for me to stop. This is what I want to make of myself one day, he’s going to have to get used to the idea.”

He left the bar not long after that. He texted Kurogane when he got home and locked the door behind himself. Kurogane replied not five minutes later and within the hour Fai was in bed.

The weeks where Kurogane worked late were never fun. They weren’t common, just shy of being a monthly thing, though they were random by Fai’s guess. He didn’t see Kurogane at all during this time, his boyfriend being too worn out by a day long shift and simply needing some time to recharge. It was fine by Fai, he understood the importance of personal space and time and took his where he could get it. 

It was also the perfect opportunity to snoop around those old crime scenes without needing to come up with excuses for his worrywart of a boyfriend. Which was exactly what Fai was doing tonight and the tender hour of 3AM. 

One of the downtown apartment buildings had played unfortunate host to not one, but two of the Silver Dragon’s murders which had, understandably, prompted a lot of tenants to pack up and move somewhere with a lower mortality rate. Those who couldn’t afford the move bought deadbolts for their doors and bars for their windows. Rent in the apartments had dropped and those who were truly desperate for a roof over their heads had slowly begun to trickle in. There were still swaths of empty apartments, but one of the ones that had been a crime scene itself had been rented out a few months ago and if only Fai could convince the new tenants to let him poke around a little he might just get lucky. 

He had called ahead, set up an appointment of sorts with them. Four people lived in the two bedroom apartment, a pair of couples by Fai’s understanding. Two of them worked night shifts, prompting the late night visit. He was supposed to meet them and explain more about his project and if they were interested he’d be allowed to look around. 

When he got to the fifth floor apartment, though, he found the front door ajar. Heart hammering in his chest, Fai took a shuddering breath and silently slipped into the apartment, hoping against hope that the criminal did not, in fact, always return to the scene of the crime. 

The lights were all off and Fai couldn’t hear anything, not even a whisper of fear or pain. Hands shaking, he dug into his bag for his taser. Something wasn’t right, he could feel it. 

He didn’t scream when he saw the first pool of blood, but it was a near thing. The moon reflected off the wet tiles and the blood looked black and not even Fai could lie to himself and pretend it was anything else. He stumbled back, trying and failing to stifle a whimper, and collided with something warm and alive.

Reflexively Fai spun around, taser ready, but found his wrist caught in a large, warm hand. With a squeeze and a twist Fai’s taser was forced free and clattered to the floor. He was shoved back and something told him the push wasn’t as rough as it could have been.

Frantically, his hand groped at the wall and when he found the light switch he flicked it on and that was when Fai came face to face with the Silver Dragon, blood on his face and arms and shirt, eyes inhuman and aglow. 

“Kurogane?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed. Comments and kudos are always appreciated! <3


	3. Nesting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Through no small amount of effort, Sakura has finally come home with Fai and Kurogane to stay.

Fai didn’t know much about adopting an orphan who had also been kidnapped and nearly sold on the black market, but he felt like it should have been more difficult, though the mountains of paperwork and hours upon hours of interviews with all sorts of federal suits were no walk in the park. 

The little girl was named Sakura, she was going to be eight years old in April. She liked cats and the color pink. She liked cooking with her father, but wasn’t very good at it and when she grew up she wanted to be a circus acrobat. Fai loved her already.

He wasn’t sure exactly what Kurogane had told the cops or the social service people, but whatever it was they’d bought it -- hook, line, and sinker. Fai had the story he was meant to stick to; they’d found Sakura hunched over by the fence when they’d gone to check out the railyard like Kurogane had been requested to do, she’d been frantic and dirty and they’d forced open a hole in the fence to get at her and that’s when they’d called the cops. It wasn’t terribly inaccurate to what had actually happened which made it easier to stick to the lie. 

The police had decided that the deal had gone south between the kidnappers and it had ended in a deadly brawl. No one mentioned how obvious it was that Sakura had at the very least been responsible for a few hits in her escape. 

They’d been allowed to foster her after only a few days, setting up an air mattress Fai had borrowed from Hokuto for Sakura to sleep on, though most nights found her in bed between him and Kurogane. They’d been told she had been hysterical while they were away and that she refused to go near or speak to anyone until at least one of them was around. A few more weeks saw them officially taking her in. That was when it all started to set in for Fai.

Sakura was away for the day getting a few talks and some final look overs from whoever was handling her case. Kurogane had promised her that she was going to come back to them and had told her to behave and she’d nodded, wide eyed and small. 

“We don’t know anything about raising a kid!” Fai said, edging on hysterical himself and pacing the length of their livingroom. “How are we supposed to take care of a little girl?”

Kurogane had been watching him pace from the couch the entire time. “You’ve been bugging me for a cat for months.”

“A small human is not the same thing, Kurogane!” Fai insisted, his voice pitching a few octaves higher than usual. “A cat you can leave on its own for a few days so long as there’s food and water in a bowl, you can’t do that to a little kid! They need attention and guidance and structure. And that’s a normal kid!”

Normal hadn’t been Fai’s life for a few years now, it hadn’t been Kurogane’s life since he was young, so very young, and now it wasn’t Sakura’s life either. 

Now two people in Fai’s life would be skulking through the shadows and bringing terror and pain upon unsuspecting souls.

Fai ran his hands through his hair, tugged at a few knots with his fingers, an old nervous habit, and let out a shuddering breath. He was going to have grey hairs before he was thirty-five. “Are… are you sure there’s-”

“Yes,” Kurogane said, finally standing and walking over to Fai. “She is what she is now, Fai.” His voice was gentle and the way he rested a hand on Fai’s shoulder was comforting. “She is what I am and you know there’s no changing that.”

Fai looked up at Kurogane. For all intents and purposes he looked utterly human now, nothing about him pointed to anything supernatural or monstrous and if Fai didn’t know the truth he’d have no idea. He hadn’t had any idea for over a year, never would have known at all if he hadn’t all but tripped over Kurogane that fateful night. It felt like a lifetime ago. 

The memory of glowing eyes with black slits for pupils was clear in his mind, though. Fai knew what he was looking at, even if the mask fooled the rest of the world, even if it had fooled him once. This man he loved was no man at all.

“I worry about you when you go out,” Fai said, doing his best to keep his voice steady. “And now I’m going to worry about her as well and there’s nothing I can do to help either of you. I’m just human.”

Kurogane leaned down then and kissed Fai, a comforting thing, soft and slow and warm. It made Fai melt and when Kurogane’s hand came to cradle his face Fai leaned into the touch. “I managed to live all on my own for years, knowing absolutely nothing about what had happened to me. I know what I’m doing now and she will not be alone.”

“I’m still going to worry.”

“I’d like it if you trusted me to keep the two of us safe, though.”

Fai did. He did trust Kurogane. The fact that he stood before him now, that they shared a bed and a home and a life attested to how much Fai trusted Kurogane. It was probably foolish of him to do so, it would be a simple thing for Kurogane to kill Fai, turn him into his next meal and walk away. Fai trusted that the love Kurogane had for him would keep him from doing that, just like he trusted that his love for Fai had Kurogane picking more “deserving” targets for his meals. 

Before, Kurogane had killed whoever it was easiest to kill. His only rule had been to never kill children, but after the truth had come out to Fai he’d agreed, for Fai’s sake, to find criminals, people who deserved the pain and fear of Kurogane coming to call. For all Fai knew those had been nothing but empty promises, but trust and love were powerful things, and Fai believed everything Kurogane told him.

The spare bedroom that had been an office was finally cleaned out. It had taken them a single, intensive day, but they’d removed both desks and a filing cabinet that had no business being as disagreeable as it had been. There was now a second hand twin bed with pretty princess sheets and what Kurogane had said was a silly amount of pillows on it, hauled in while Sakura was gone. There was a dresser in one corner covered in whimsical drawings of birds already filled with several outfits worth of clothes. There was a nightlight plugged in and a teddy bear wrapped in a bow waiting for a little girl to come home and name it.

Sakura was still wide-eyed when they finally brought her home to stay. She was quiet and didn’t smile as much as Fai would have liked. She didn’t laugh or speak unless spoken to, but she did sit on his lap while he ate dinner and even snuck a cookie from his small pile later that night. She didn’t fuss and went to bed when they told her to. She was a good child.

“You’re making a face,” Kurogane said, tapping Fai’s forehead lightly. 

The pair of them were getting ready for bed themselves. Fai was brushing out his hair beside Kurogane who had just finished brushing his teeth. “That’s my face, Kuro-pon.” For that he earned himself a soft thump on the head and a look that plainly stated Kurogane thought he was full of it. “Alright, I’m worried about Sakura-chan. Kids aren’t meant to be so… quiet and well behaved.”

Kurogane sighed. “Kids aren’t meant to watch their families be murdered and then kidnapped either. Give her time.”

Kurogane was right.

That night Sakura crawled into bed with them, hunkered down between them and slept through dreams that made her whimper and made her little face scrunch up. The next morning she broke the eggs for pancakes and helped Fai burn the bacon. She laughed when Kurogane grabbed a piece and burnt his finger in the process, but proceeded to eat the crispy slice of meat anyway. He kissed Fai goodbye and Sakura smiled when he ruffled her hair affectionately before leaving for work.

“So,” Fai said cheerily. “What kind of things does Sakura-chan like on her pancakes?”

Sakura pursed her lips and stared down the stack of pancakes seeming for all the world like she was deep in thought. “Strawberries and maple syrup,” she chirped. She looked up at Fai through her bangs as if trying to see if she was pushing her luck.

He smiled down at her and pulled a bottle of syrup from the cabinet. “Why don’t you check the fridge and see what we’ve got in there.” 

She hopped off her step stool and pulled the door open with some effort -- she was a little thing, enough baby fat to make her face round and edges soft, but there wasn’t much else to her -- and Fai watched as she all but climbed into the refrigerator with a smile. He knew for a fact there was a carton of strawberries behind the milk jug and it wasn’t hard to find, but Sakura was intent on pulling open all of the drawers before so much as glancing at the shelves apparently. 

He knew the second she found them though, delighted squeal sudden and loud. “There are strawberries! I found them! I found them!”

“Good job! Let’s rinse them off and slice them up,” Fai laughed. Nothing cheered people up like good food, and Sakura was no different. “Pick out the ones you think are the tastiest.”

Sakura chose a handful of berries with the same intense thought as an action hero who was trying to decide whether to cut the red wire or the blue. She stood close and watched Fai slice off the leafy tops and it wasn’t until he’d finished cutting up the second berry that he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

He set the knife down carefully and looked down at Sakura, who was still staring at the sharp edge as if Fai hadn’t stopped moving it. Her eyes were bright and Fai could see the tips of little claws where Sakura’s hands gripped the edge of the counter. Something about the way Sakura stood, hunched over just a little and eyes fixed, reminded Fai of a cat ready to pounce, though the feeling that he was in danger dispelled most of the cuteness of such an idea.

Kurogane hadn’t told him about anything like this and Fai’s first instinct was to call him and have him come home, but he’d already been burning through his vacation days to deal with the interviews and paperwork of adopting Sakura and he was taking a half day as it was. Fai was sure he’d be able to handle this, at least until Kurogane came home. It wasn’t as if he actually expected Sakura was going to try to hurt him.

Gently, Fai took Sakura’s face in his hands and turned her away from the cutting board. He waved his hand in front of her until she was focusing on him. “Sakura-chan? Are you alright?”

“Yes?” The tone she used made it clear that she wasn’t sure why Fai was asking or why he’d stopped preparing breakfast. Whatever was going on she didn’t realize it was happening.

Then, something clicked. Just like Kurogane, Sakura fed off of violence just as much as she needed to be fed three balanced meals. Between the knife and the red juice of the strawberries Fai supposed her brand new instincts might have kicked in. “I think it’d be best of you sat at the table and waited for me to bring you your pancakes, hm?”

It was clear she still didn’t understand why he was asking this of her, but she nodded and went to sit. Fai made quick work of the rest of the prep and served Sakura with his best and showiest flourish and biggest, brightest smile. By the time the first drop of syrup hit the pancakes Sakura’s eyes were no longer glowing and she seemed to have forgotten all about what had happened. Fai, however, had not, and for the rest of the day he kept a careful eye on her.

Sakura spent the rest of the morning contentedly coloring in front of the television with cartoons playing while Fai either busied himself with housework or joined her on the carpet with a crayon in his hand. He taught her how to draw cats and she made rather interesting arguments about why it was entirely plausible for cats to come in the colors pink, red, and polkadot. 

Lunch was a blessedly uneventful affair and by the time Kurogane returned home a bit more than an hour later Sakura was curled up with her teddy bear, dubbed Kero almost immediately, snoozing away on the couch.

“Well, she’s still breathing and in one piece,” Kurogane said looking fondly down at Sakura. “Done worrying about not knowing how to take care of a kid?”

Fai rolled his eyes and pulled Kurogane down for a kiss. “It’s been one day, give me time,” he said. It had been shockingly easy to handle Sakura, but he was sure the course wouldn’t stay so smooth forever, that was just how life went after all. “Also, we need to talk. Something happened.”

Fai explained what had happened at breakfast and shared his theory with Kurogane, who looked about as puzzled as Fai felt. He knew Kurogane’s early years had been a messy blur of loss and confusion. It had been months and years of trial and error and Kurogane as a lonely, lost child trying desperately to survive the aftermath of his own personal hell. Him not having the answers to whatever was going on with Sakura wasn’t unexpected.

“What about that person you met a few years ago, the one who helped you get on your feet?” Fai asked. Kurogane had never given Fai his mentor’s name and Fai very easily understood the need for anonymity. In fact, Fai was fairly sure whatever name Kurogane had for the person he’d met it wasn’t even a real name. Still, he held out hope that there was a way for Kurogane to get into contact with them.

The tired sigh Kurogane gave him said otherwise. “As helpful as that’d be, we’re not so lucky.” And didn’t Fai know it. “It’s nothing we can’t handle, though. Most of the time, when this happens, things like me are alone, she’s not.” It was something Kurogane seemed to be clinging to as much as Fai was. He hoped for Sakura’s sake that they hadn’t bitten off more than they could chew.

Fai watched Sakura’s little chest rise and fall as she slept and forced down the fear he could feel gnawing at the edges of his already frayed nerves. He and Kurogane weren’t going to let anything else happen to this little girl. “At least she’s got some good luck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you guys are enjoying this so far. Comments are always appreciated and make my day <3


	4. Migration

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like this chapter _might_ come off as a little OOC but if you think that you should have seen the first draft. Hoo!

Kurogane was handsome and smart. He had a bit of a short temper and hated sweets, but he was thoughtful and endlessly patient where it mattered. He remembered Fai’s favorite foods and his birthday and his allergy to shellfish. He let Fai lace their fingers together when they held hands walking down the street and didn’t stop him from swinging their arms a little bit like Fai was still in middle school with his first girlfriend. He kissed slow and soft, just like Fai liked, and could pick Fai up and carry him around like it was nothing. 

He was the man of Fai’s dreams, and he was standing in front of Fai splattered in blood that was not his with eyes that no human could ever possess. 

“I told you not to do anything stupid.”

This could not be Kurogane, Fai told himself. It couldn’t be. Kurogane wasn’t a murderer, he wasn’t a monster, and he certainly wasn’t the Silver Dragon. 

“Don’t know why I thought you’d actually listen to me, though.”

If it wasn’t Kurogane, though, Fai didn’t know what else it could be. “This isn’t happening. It’s not. I- I’ve got to be seeing things,” Fai said, voice trembling. He screwed his eyes closed and turned his head away. “Kuro-sama is not the Silver Dragon.”

There was a tired sigh and the sound of Kurogane (no, not Kurogane, it couldn’t be Kurogane, please don’t let it be Kurogane) stepping closer. “I always thought that was such a dramatic sounding name, but it was better than some of the others,” he said, almost conversationally, like they were at Fai’s house, curled up on his too small couch and the movie they were watching was too boring to really pay attention to. “The Rabid Grimm, the Silent Butcher, Frenzy Pack -- that one they still think it was more than one person -- naming killers like that is a pretty stupid habit. Sensationalizes them.”

“Stop it,” Fai whimpered. He felt sick. He was only managing to stay standing thanks to the wall behind him and terror was clawing up his throat and burning his eyes. 

“No. I told you to stop sticking your nose in places it didn’t belong-”

“You told me you didn’t want me to get hurt!” Fai snapped, Kurogane’s patronizing tone riling his temper to drown the fear swallowing him up. His face lifted to glare at Kurogane in all his inhuman, gory presence. “You said you were worried about me! But _you’re_ the Dragon, you’re the danger! You lied to me!”

It was quickly dawning on him that those late nights at work, those worried wishes for Fai to keep safe and away from the Silver Dragon’s trail, all of it was one massive chain of lies. It wasn’t as if Fai was a completely honest man, he’d lied to Kurogane about coming here and so much more, but this… this was something else.

“All that concern, it was all for yourself,” Fai spat. 

Kurogane’s mouth opened, whether to lie again or threaten Fai he didn’t wait to find out. Fai had self defense training and, the man he loved or not, Kurogane was a threat and Fai needed to run. He lunged without warning, feigned to the left and came up with a kick that Kurogane side stepped. He was still between Fai and the door and even if Fai managed to get around him Kurogane would be able to catch up in no time unless Fai somehow slowed him down. His taser was somewhere on the floor and out of reach and the mace he had would probably meet the same fate, though Fai still kept it in mind. 

He gave another lunge at Kurogane, took a few jabs that were blocked or dodged before aiming the heel up his palm upward, aiming to break Kurogane’s nose. His arm was caught effortlessly and twisted behind his back. Between one breath and the next Kurogane shoved Fai up against the wall once more, rougher than before but still with no more force than was really needed to keep a struggling Fai in place.

“You know, if I were anything else you’d have gotten away,” Kurogane said, pressing close to Fai and sounding pleased of all things.

Through his struggling and fear Fai had still heard what Kurogane had said. He froze. “Any _thing_ else?” With the way his eyes looked Fai had already figured that much out on his own, but something about hearing it confirmed was unexpected. The way it was said, as if it were a simple fact of life.

It might have been, to Kurogane anyway.

Fai could feel himself begin to tremble in Kurogane’s grip. This was it, he was going to die and the man he’d fallen in love with was going to be the one to kill him. Everything had been a lie and the only good thing in Fai’s life was what would end it. He felt every ounce of strength leave him and he slumped in Kurogane’s grip. He was sure there was some cruel, poetic irony here, but he couldn’t be fucked to find it. 

Kurogane released Fai, though he didn’t step back. He turned Fai around to face him, lifted his chin and how gently he touched Fai was no different than any other time in their last year and a half of dating, but now it seemed disturbing, unnatural. _Wrong_. He wanted Fai to look at him and Fai simply could not do it. He screwed his eyes shut again, tried to yank his chin free of those curling fingers -- fingers he only now realized were claws, nails long and sharp and beast-like. Kurogane would not let him go though.

“Fai would you look at me?” He sounded too calm, too patient, too much like the man Fai had kissed goodnight and good morning and hello. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t play this game.

He couldn’t put up a fight anymore either. 

“Stop it,” Fai said again. He sounded just as weak as he felt and he wished Kurogane would get this over with. He didn’t want to be toyed with, if it was to end he wanted it over. “If you’re gonna kill me just do it already.”

“Do you really think I _want_ to kill you?” He sounded disappointed and annoyed, the same tone of voice he used when he thought Fai was being dramatically unreasonable.

Fai was getting really sick of Kurogane speaking to him as if they _weren’t_ standing at the scene of several murders and what was soon to be Fai’s grave. “I swear to every god willing to listen that if you say you don’t want to kill me but you have to I will find a way to take us both out.”

His eyes were still shut, a final, stubborn act of defiance. His heart was aching, broken beneath the terror that had it hammering in his chest. He’d really thought he and Kurogane could have been something great, that they could have gone the distance. He thought they could have been happy together. All the more fool him, really. He wasn’t a man meant to go anywhere or accomplish anything significant. He wasn’t someone who got to be happy at the end of the day.

Kurogane scoffed. “I don’t have to do anything,” he said. “And I don’t want to kill you, but first we need to talk.”

He had no idea what Kurogane could possibly have to say to him that wasn’t some sort of excuse or lie, but he wasn’t really in a position to argue with him. And, if Fai were to be honest with himself, there was a part of him that hoped that whatever Kurogane had to say would fix this whole ordeal and make everything go back to the way it had been. He was too angry though, too hurt. Too scared. “I don’t want to hear it.”

“Don’t be an asshole.”

“Says the guy covered in gore.”

“It’s only some blood- dammit, Fai will you just listen to me?” Kurogane ground out, frustrated. He let go of Fai’s face but didn’t step away, used his body to keep Fai pinned against the wall. He didn’t give Fai the chance to refuse again, kept talking. “I’m not killing these people for fun, I have to in order to live. I’m not human and I can’t help that. I also can’t help how much you mean to me, so I’m giving you a choice.” Fai didn’t know what options there could possibly be, but he didn’t interrupt Kurogane. “If you promise to never tell anyone about this, and I’ll know if you’re lying, believe me, I’ll let you walk out of here and you’ll never have to see me again.”

That last bit had Fai opening his eyes to look at Kurogane. 

What did it say about Fai and his state of mind that the thought of never seeing Kurogane again, of living a life without him, was the most terrifying thing about tonight? As he was standing there Fai knew he’d never tell anyone what he’d seen tonight, he’d never betray Kurogane like that. This was a secret that would die with him, whether now in this forlorn apartment or years down the line. But without Kurogane it was hard to see the point in keeping his mouth shut just to live. It would be an empty life. Nothing had brought him happiness like Kurogane had in years and Fai was sure nothing else ever would again.

“You’re going to leave? Just like that?” Fai choked out. His head was swimming, there was too much going on, he was running on adrenalin and caffeine and little else. He wished he had never come here tonight.

Kurogane was watching him carefully with glowing eyes that Fai was having less and less trouble meeting. “I’ve done it before, I’ll do it again. I’ve been offered a new position a few hours away, they’ve been trying to convince me to go for weeks now.”

“Weeks?” Fai said dumbly. He was sure Kurogane had never mentioned moving away to him. “You never told me about this.”

It was so incredibly human looking when Kurogane rolled his eyes, like there was nothing different about him at all. An odd sense of normality had slowly descended upon them. “I’d been putting it off _because_ of you. I wasn’t about to ask you to drop everything and move to a completely different city with me.”

Which was a shame because Fai would have moved away with Kurogane in a heartbeat. Fai had fallen for Kurogane hard and fast, only a month into their relationship Fai had known he wanted to be with Kurogane for the rest of his life. More than a year later and that feeling hadn’t gone away, only deepened. One thing after another Fai had learned about Kurogane had only endeared him further to him. He was lost on this man and to try and put up a fight against it was a venture doomed to fail. 

There wasn’t any thought behind Fai’s actions when he reached out with shaking hands and grabbed Kurogane’s shirt. He clung tightly to the fabric of a plain, dime-a-dozen shirt and felt himself shake his head, eyes wide and everything in him screaming.

“You can’t leave,” he insisted, his voice trembled along with his body, everything about him unsteady. “Why didn’t you just ask me to go with you? What have I got going for me in this city that would keep me here? You’re the only thing I have worth fighting for!”

Tears were burning hot at the corner of his eyes. If Kurogane left him it was just as good as killing him.

He didn’t know what about Kurogane was the truth and what was a lie to cover up what he was. He didn’t know exactly how much truth Kurogane had kept from him and right now, with everything happening so quickly around him, Fai didn’t care. He didn’t care if Kurogane was some killer or monster or whatever have you, Fai loved him. A part of him knew he wasn’t thinking clearly at the moment and that come morning and a bit of clarity he might regret whatever choices he made tonight, but it was insignificant compared to the desperate need to keep Kurogane in his life right now. 

“I won’t tell anyone, you know I won’t, but please don’t leave me.” Fai was begging and it was pathetic, but what else could he do. “Take me with you.”

“Fai…” there was doubt clear in Kurogane’s voice.

“Listen to me,” Fai argued. “What have I got here that I can’t get in some other city? A dead end job waiting tables? A cramped apartment with a leaky bathroom faucet? Kuro-sama, you’re the only good thing to happen to me in ages.”

“I’m not human,” Kurogane said as if Fai hadn’t cottoned on to that yet. 

“I don’t care.” And right now he didn’t.

“I’m going to keep killing people, I can’t stop, ever.”

“I don’t care.” He did, but Fai could lie to himself, Kurogane could lie to him.

Kurogane sighed. “You can’t just make a decision like this in the middle of the night without thinking it through.”

It wasn’t as if Fai was being given much choice in the matter. If Kurogane had mentioned that he’d been offered a chance to move with his job Fai would have had more time to think about it, and he told him as much, which only earned him a glare that looked like Kurogane even through the blood and eyes and what Fai was realizing were fangs. He could learn to love this creature as surely as he loved the man he’d thought Kurogane was, and the thought only made him a little sick.

“We can talk about this in the morning,” Kurogane said after a long moment of considering Fai. “Who knew you were coming here?”

Fai blinked up at Kurogane and answered, surprised into honesty. “No one, I didn’t even take a cab, I walked.”

“And you’re sure about this? I can leave and you can call the police as if you’d just found these people,” Kurogane offered. “You won’t tell them about me, I know that.”

He moved suddenly, used his hold on Kurogane’s shirt to pull him down while Fai surged upwards until he was on tiptoe, and kissed him. He felt blood, sticky and cooling, smear on his face and he tasted copper where his lips met Kurogane’s. He could feel the sharp prick of fangs against his tongue as he licked into Kurogane’s mouth.

Kurogane didn’t stop him. He pulled Fai closer with one arm and cradled his face with his other hand. He deepened the kiss, slowed Fai’s half frantic pace, made it a promise. Fai really didn’t care, not right now. When their kiss ended Fai looped an arm around the back of Kurogane’s neck, kept him close and put their foreheads together. He kept his eyes closed and just held on to Kurogane. 

There was blood on him now, he could feel it drying against his skin, making his too thin shirt stick to his chest. It was awful and Fai itched to take a long hot shower and scrub his skin clean. 

“I’m going to take you home with me,” Kurogane said. “I’ll explain everything after we get some sleep.”

Fai nodded, clung tighter to Kurogane. He didn’t trust himself to speak.

He felt Kurogane brush his knuckles along Fai’s jaw, received a chaste kiss, and then everything very suddenly went dark.


	5. Fledgling Needs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sakura takes the news of her new condition about as well as one would expect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I stalled out a little on this fic a while ago, which is why this update took so long. Hopefully I'll be gathering steam again soon. It's been quite A Time in my life as of late.

There was no name for what Kurogane and Sakura were. They were obscure creatures, ones that only the most dedicated and knowledgeable of mythologists even heard whispers about. They were born human, like anyone else, but something changed them. Horror and nightmares turned reality at a young age, blood shed by hands that could still barely hold a fork and dripping from faces still round with baby fat. 

Violence was the catalyst and violence was what fueled them for the rest of their lives. It fed them as surely as any food and without it they’d wither and starve. Kurogane had taught Fai all he knew about himself, things he’d had to learn on his own as a child fumbling, scared and alone, through life. 

Violence of any sort would do, whether he caused it or it was directed upon him, Kurogane would draw strength from it. However, taking the pain of violence onto himself, as he’d tried to do as a boy, wasn’t enough. He was not indestructible and he healed like any human would. Getting into fist fights behind bars was enough to stave off his hunger for a few days, at best, but he had always been on the edge of starvation, hunger gnawing at him constantly. 

Death was the only answer. Murder was the ultimate violent act. It kept him appeased for weeks and once he was an adult, it was the only thing that would.

Kurogane had told Fai all of this ages ago when Fai had woken up in Kurogane’s bed late in the morning after discovering what he was. Now Fai watched and listened as Kurogane explained it all to Sakura. It wasn’t something anyone wanted to hear, to find out monsters were real and that you were now one of them would break anyone’s heart, let alone a child’s. 

She cried. She wailed, asked them to fix it, to make her better. Sakura told them she didn’t want to be a bad person, that her family had always taught her to help people, not hurt them. Fai held her, rubbed soothing circles on her back while Kurogane stood nearby and waited her out. 

Fai didn’t blame him. He could only imagine how Kurogane had felt when he’d learned the truth, when he’d finally connected the dots and realized what he’d have to do in order to live. He was sure there were plenty of children like this who died because they refused to raise their hands against others. He couldn’t let Sakura be one of them.

He eased her back until she was sitting up and looking at him. He used his thumbs to wipe away her tears and smiled. “Sakura-chan, do you remember why you hurt that man at the warehouse before we found you?” She nodded but didn’t explain herself, which was fine. “And do you remember why you helped Kuro-tan hurt those other men when they came looking for you?” Again she nodded. “It’s because they were bad men right? And they hurt you and your family.”

“Yeah,” she sniffled. He lip started quivering again and Fai shushed her gently. 

“Those are the sort of people Kuro-min hurts,” Fai explained. “He finds the bad people like the men who took away your family, and he makes sure they won’t hurt anyone else ever again, and you’re going to help him.”

Sakura didn’t look like she really believed Fai all that much and the face Kurogane was giving him made it clear that he thought the explanation was a bit half assed. It was the best option they had, though, next to letting Sakura cry herself sick and starve to death. 

“I know you don’t want to do this, Sakura-chan,” Fai said. “I wish you didn’t have to, but I also don’t want you to die.”

She wouldn’t have to kill for a while. Going along with Kurogane and doing whatever it was that he did would be enough to keep her going. It would be years before her options narrowed down to a choice between murder or starvation. It wasn’t a comforting thing, not for Fai and not for Sakura, but it was all they had outside of flat out lying to themselves. 

Kurogane had tried to be comforting, but that had never been his strong suit. Fai could remember several nights spent crying on his shoulder over one thing or another. After the first two times Kurogane had stopped trying to help and had resigned himself to sitting there and holding Fai silently until he managed to calm himself down. That wasn’t something that was about to suddenly change now that they had Sakura with them.

Sakura spent the rest of the day away from them shut in her room and not making a sound. She declined lunch stubbornly and Fai kept Kurogane from forcing his way into her room no less than four times. She accepted the plate of food Fai brought her for dinner, but remained in her room well past bedtime.

“She can’t sit in there and sulk forever,” Kurogane groused.

“Of course she can’t, but give her some time,” Fai said, standing from where he was sprawled out on the couch. He’d been hoping the sight of him all laid out and inviting would have been enough to pull Kurogane away from his pacing, but he’d had no such luck. “It hasn’t been very long since everything happened to her, she’s still adjusting. How long did it take you?”

That seemed to be enough to halt Kurogane’s steps. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, eyes still trying valiantly to bore through Sakura’s door by sheer force of will alone. “I couldn’t even tell you, honestly. Months at least. Longer probably.”

Fai came up behind him and wrapped his arms around Kurogane’s waist. “And you were alone, which she is clearly not,” he pointed out. It was their single greatest life line in this, the comforting phrase they repeated to soothe worries. He nuzzled his face against Kurogane’s back through the soft fabric of his shirt. “We’re going to take care of her.”

He heard Kurogane huff, an amused sound, before he turned around in the circle of Fai’s arms. “What happened to all that panic about not knowing how to care for a child?”

“Oh, I still have no idea what I’m doing.” Fai smiled and leaned up to kiss Kurogane’s jaw. “But the social worker gave me a list of books to look at and I picked a few of them up.”

“There aren’t any books about this,” Kurogane countered, ran fingers through Fai’s hair.

Fai leaned happily into the touch. Kurogane was always so perfectly gentle with him. He’d appreciated it the beginning, and once he’d found out the truth, every single gesture had begun to mean so much more. Gentleness was not in Kurogane’s nature, but it was the only thing Fai had ever experience with him, for that he’d always be unspeakably thankful and touched. 

“No,” he agreed. “But there’s your life experience, and that will always trump book learning in my opinion.”

Kurogane hummed in what could have been agreement, or just him indicating that he’d heard Fai speak, it was difficult to tell sometimes, even for him. Kurogane rested his chin atop Fai’s head, his fingers never once stilled from their petting. He seemed distracted suddenly and Fai kept quiet and still and listened to Kurogane breathe. 

“She’s asleep,” he said after a minute.

Fai pulled his head back and looked up at Kurogane incredulously. “You can hear her?”

He knew Kurogane had extremely sensitive hearing, heightened like all of his other senses, but to be able to tell if someone was awake or asleep by sound alone was ridiculous. “Your heartbeat slows when you fall sleep,” he said by way of an explanation. “She’s probably been out for the last twenty or so minutes.”

Nights had been choppy for all of them as of late. Sakura rarely slept through the night, and when she woke up she would climb into bed between the two of them and whimper until she fell back asleep. It wasn’t so much a problem for Fai, he’d only been working at the bistro on Sunday afternoons since they’d taken Sakura in. Kurogane, however, was back to working full time and the lack of sleep was probably something he could do without.

Not to mention they’d been forced to curb their more amorous inclinations between everything that was happening in their lives. Fai was feeling the itch under his skin and he was sure Kurogane was feeling much the same. It was a theory that was quickly proving itself true as the hand Kurogane didn’t have in Fai’s hair trailed slowly down his back, fingers dragging along Fai’s spine until Kurogane’s hand was cupping his ass and pulling him close. 

The surprised squeak Fai let out was wholly embarrassing, but it was swallowed quickly by Kurogane. The kiss was slow, deep and edged with hunger of a carnal sort. It had been too long, almost three weeks now, since they’d been able to do more than share sweetly chase kisses in passing and lay next to each other on the couch or in bed before Sakura wormed her way between them. He would never begrudge their new daughter affection from her two caretakers, but Fai was a man with needs. Still…

“Mm, Kuro-grope, what about Sakura-chan?”

“I’ll hear her if she wakes up,” Kurogane said, dipping his head to kiss at Fai’s neck and effectively turn his knees to jello. “We can even lock the door so she can’t just walk in.”

The feel of the low rumble of Kurogane’s voice was just as much an argument as the words themselves and any other worries Fai might have had evaporated and vanished like smoke as Kurogane’s tongue traced patterns on Fai’s neck. Fai’s arms lifted to come around Kurogane’s shoulders and that was all he needed as way of an agreement to lift Fai easily off the ground, as if he weighed nothing at all, and walk them both down the hall to their bedroom. 

The door was shut with an easy nudge of Kurogane’s foot and Fai was shuffled into one of his arms as he locked the door. The casual display of strength lit a fire in Fai’s belly and he bit down the side of Kurogane’s neck, teeth rough enough to have Kurogane throwing his head back and moaning before pushing Fai against a wall and reclaiming his mouth. 

They would have to be quick. Sakura might sleep for hours at a stretch, but neither of them really wanted to chance her having to wake up to them in the middle of love making. Fai didn’t have a problem with quick. So long as he got his hands and mouth on Kurogane he would be content.

And content he was. They hadn’t had each other up against a wall like that in ages and Fai, for one, had missed it, the excitement and illusion that they were a pair of teens sneaking off for a late night tryst. Now, an hour later, they were both showered, sated, and dressed for bed, tangled together under their sheets. Fai’s face was tucked under Kurogane’s jaw, nose nuzzling shower fresh skin and lips leaving feather light kisses everywhere he could reach. 

He dropped off to sleep like that, nestled comfortably against Kurogane’s side, the door unlocked in case Sakura needed them, and a bone deep warmth making his limbs pleasantly heavy.

Morning came suddenly and loudly in the form of Sakura leaping on to the bed and landing solidly on both Fai and Kurogane, who had still been half wrapped up in each other even in sleep. The wind was knocked right out of Fai with a small knee to his gut and Kurogane didn’t seem to be fairing much better with the little girl clamboring up and into his face. 

Still half asleep Fai didn’t notice anything amiss until he felt the pricks of tiny, sharp little claws on his arm. The wound was accidental and no worse than the prick of a needle, Sakura still being small and her new, beastly characteristics juvenile. Still, the pain was sharp enough to wake Fai up properly and have him reflexively rolling away with a muffled exclamation. He managed to keep himself from toppling off the bed entirely, but only just. 

Both Kurogane and Sakura turned to look at him, Kurogane human for all intents and purposes, but Sakura’s eyes were bright and slitted and he could see the tip of tiny fangs poking out from under her lip.

“Sakura-chan, are you okay?” Fai asked, more worried about his foster daughter than the single bead of blood gradually welling up on his arm. 

She looked uncomfortable, little mouth pouting, even as her eyes were fixated on the cut she’d made on Fai. “I’m hungry.”

It was not the sort of hungry a plate of breakfast was going to fix, Fai knew. He looked over at Kurogane, hoping he could see how out of his depth Fai was. Thankfully, Kurogane, for all that he was rather anti-social, was excellent at reading people.

“He’s not on the menu,” Kurogane said, gaining Sakura’s attention. “You should have said something sooner, before it got too hard to ignore.” Sakura looked down at the clawed hands curled in her lap. She knew she was being chastised and that she really had no excuse. As much as she didn’t want this she couldn’t deny her new needs and instincts. “You can’t hurt Fai, you’ll be stronger than him before long.”

“It’s not a big deal, Sakura-chan,” Fai reassured. “But I would appreciate it if you were a little more careful from now on.”

While some small part of Fai puffed up indignantly at the idea of a small child being stronger than him he knew it was true. Even Sakura, small for her age and soft around all her edges, would be able to out match Fai before long. He was no pushover himself, either. He was thin, willowy even, but he was lean with muscle. He jogged and did yoga and kept himself in shape. Living with Kurogane, there wasn’t much of an option, not that Kurogane had ever told him how to live his life.

“We’re gonna have to go out tonight,” Kurogane sighed, sitting himself up. Fai wasn’t surprised to hear it. If Sakura was jumping them at -- Fai glanced at the clock by the bed -- five in the morning, something had to be done.

Fai slipped out of bed and rubbed at his face. There wasn’t going to be any getting back to sleep now, he might as well use the extra time to start on a nice breakfast they’d be able to enjoy before Kurogane left for work. He might even have the time to make him a nice, home cooked lunch as well. 

He expected Sakura and Kurogane to follow after him and when they weren’t at his heels he assumed Kurogane was giving her a talking to of sorts. He was sure it involved their upcoming night out and Fai was better off not knowing anything about that. He would avoid that truth as completely as he could until his dying day.

Fai was half way through pouring muffin batter into a pan when there was a heavy thump from the bedroom. He was down the hall and flinging the bedroom door open within a matter of seconds and gaping at what he saw.

The sound had been Kurogane and Sakura falling out of bed and to the floor. He was on his back and Sakura was sprawled out across his chest, looking more than a little disoriented after falling. Kurogane was covered in thin, red scratches and there was a clear bite mark on his bicep that was bleeding. There was a small dribble of blood at the corner of Sakura’s mouth and red was smudged on her lips. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what had happened and Fai was terrified for a moment that Sakura had tried to attack Kurogane, even if she was too small to do much damage. 

“Don’t make that face,” Kurogane said, getting to his feet with Sakura in his arms. “It was my idea, I can’t take her out until tonight, she needed the edge taken off.”

_I didn’t want to leave you alone with her._

It wasn’t that he didn’t appreciate Kurogane looking out for him, but Fai hated feeling like he needed to be protected from Sakura. “A little warning next time, ne?” he said through a thin smile. He turned back and headed towards the kitchen and this time they did follow at his heels. He could feel Kurogane’s eyes on him, but it would have to wait until after his and Sakura’s hunt. Maybe longer if Fai had his way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I fear I may be running out of bird puns for the chapter titles.


	6. Birth of a Hawk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fai attempts to stick with his rash decision to stay with Kurogane, even after finding out his boyfriend is a murderous monster, but Kurogane doubts his resolve will hold once he knows all the facts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am trying to hard to get back in the writing groove. The KuroFai Olympics were difficult for me this year and I've been in a bit of a rough patch for a while. Here's hoping I'll be coming out of it soon!

The first thing Fai noticed as he woke up was that he was warm and wrapped in something soft. Sleepily, he burrowed further into it. It smelled familiar, made him feel safe. He slowly woke himself up, pushing lazily through the haze sleep left him with. He was in bed, but it wasn’t his bed (mattress too firm, blankets too soft, not at all worn out). He blearily blinked his eyes open to confirmed that he wasn’t in his room.

There was a dresser in his line of sight with an ornamental fan and a sheathed katana set atop it. The walls were made of dark wood panelling and when Fai pushed himself up to sit he saw the tasteful, tan carpet. On the bedside table there was a lamp and two pictures, one of a smiling mother and father that was always put face down before sex and the other was of Fai and Kurogane, Fai smiling at the camera and Kurogane looking completely besotted as he looked at Fai while they held hands. Chii had taken the picture with Kurogane’s phone a few months into his and Fai’s relationship. Fai remembered how much his heart had fluttered when he’d seen it framed on the bedside table a week later. 

With trembling fingers Fai picked it up. They looked so happy. He traced the curve of Kurogane’s face with his index finger. There was nothing strange or monstrous in the photo at all, just two men laughing with friends and in love. 

Eventually he tore his eyes away from the photo. He kept it in his lap, though, running his knuckle thoughtlessly over the glass as he took stock of himself. He was in Kurogane’s bed, alone, wearing nothing but his boxers and one of Kurogane’s old tee shirts. Fai reached out a hand to find the other side of the bed cold and unrumpled. Either Kurogane had gotten up well before him or hadn’t shared the bed at all. 

There was no noise coming from the apartment, no clinking in the kitchen or water running in the bathroom, no footsteps to tell Fai where Kurogane might be. There was no more blood on Fai’s face or hands and he didn’t remember anything about how he’d gotten there. Kurogane must have dressed him.

Not seeing much of a point to just sitting in bed Fai stood up, leaving the picture face down on the bed, and headed into the en suite bathroom, which was more like a closet with a sink and toilet than anything. His toothbrush was still there and his face wash. It was like nothing had changed. He supposed none of this would have changed in a night’s time, even if it felt like he was living a stranger’s life all of a sudden. 

He pushed the door closed and went about his morning routine numbly, and if he splashed a little more cold water on his face than he normally would it didn’t matter to anyone but him. He took his time, didn’t think about how he didn’t feel any of last night’s panic creeping up his spine or how it felt like just another morning waking up at Kurogane’s place so long as he didn’t think too hard about anything. He could almost believe it was all a nasty dream. Almost.

The sight of gore and death hung too heavily over him. 

When he came out of the bathroom Kurogane was sitting on the bed, right where Fai had woken up, and holding the picture Fai had left there. His hands weren’t claws anymore and when he turned to look at Fai his face was human. It felt like a lie.

“You’re back to normal.”

“Yeah.” Kurogane looked back down at the picture in his lap. “You know, I still remember the stupid face you made when you first saw this.”

Fai had never known Kurogane to really avoid a topic. He was a bullheaded man and as no-nonsense as a person could be in this world. It unnerved Fai to see him hesitate like that. Fai was the one who avoided questions and danced around a topic if he didn’t like it. 

At least Kurogane had the sense to know he wasn’t very good at it when Fai remained standing in the bathroom doorway, frowning with his arms crossed defensively over his chest. He set the picture back in its place but remained seated. Fai wondered it if was for his benefit, trying to appear smaller so he didn’t scare Fai off. 

Fai didn’t know if it was working. 

“How much of last night do you remember?”

“I got drunk at home and you found me wandering about downtown,” Fai tried with a shrug. “I was sloshed out of my mind and you took me home so I wouldn’t hurt myself?” 

It was Fai’s way of asking if they could just forget last night. There was still the smallest glimmer of hope that Kurogane would let him pretend and that they could go back to the way things had been. He didn’t want to know about monsters and murders. He just wanted to be a news reporter and have a hot boyfriend who kissed him good morning. But since when did Fai ever really get what he wanted?

“So, everything then?”

He nodded and Fai ignored the nauseous churning in his stomach.

“Look, Kurogane I-”

“Don’t use my full name like you’re mad at me,” Kurogane snapped, raising Fai’s hackles immediately. 

“I _am_ mad at you!” Fai said hotly. “You’ve been lying to me ever since we met! Why didn’t you tell me?”

“And when was I supposed to tell you? It’s not exactly a first date sort of topic,” he said irritably. “What did you want me to do? ‘Hey, my name is Kurogane, I’m a mechanical engineer, my star sign is leo, and, by the way, I’m some kind of monster that feeds off of violence in order to live.’ Not exactly something that gets me places.”

Fai wanted to argue, really wanted to, because he was hurt and angry and still more than a little scared, but Kurogane was right. Something like that, it wasn’t something you just told someone. There was no breaking it easy to a friend or partner. If Fai hadn’t stumbled upon him last night he probably never would have found out. 

Fai leaned heavily against the doorframe and looked away.

“I wasn’t doing it to hurt you,” Kurogane said, getting to his feet. He was going to make his way over to Fai, he was sure, but he froze when Fai startled, tensing up and eyes going wide. Kurogane sat back down heavily. It looked like a defeat and that made Fai’s chest constrict painfully. “And I’m still not going to hurt you. I don’t blame you for being afraid of me, though.”

“I’m not afraid of you,” Fai insisted. It felt like a lie, even though he desperately wanted it to be the truth. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair at Kurogane’s doubtful expression. “I’m not, not of you, exactly. This is all- It’s a lot, okay? I just-” he let out a frustrated noise and yanked a little at his hair. 

Taking a deep breath Fai squared his shoulders and walked over to where Kurogane sat. He stood there for a few moments while they looked at each other. Fai wasn’t sure what, exactly, Kurogane was getting from Fai’s face, but Kurogane’s looked reserved. Not angry or sad, just patiently waiting for the inevitable. Fai was sure that what Kurogane thought was “inevitable” was Fai leaving, declaring this whole business to be too much and allowing Kurogane to quietly disappear into a new life. 

That wasn’t going to happen though. Fai needed him. 

“Were you ever going to tell me?” Fai asked. His voice sounded steadier than he felt. “Or were you just going to up and leave me one day to wonder what the hell I’d done wrong?”

“I wouldn’t have just left, Fai, I-”

“But you _were_ going to leave?!” Fai could feel himself edging towards hysterics and fought to claw back his self control, what little he had at the moment. Kurogane wasn’t leaving without him now. Fai knew. He knew the truth and he wasn’t losing Kurogane, not if he could help it. 

“No! … Yes- I don’t know, alright?” Kurogane growled in frustration, a sound both familiar and now a little bit terrifying in the wake of new discoveries. “I should have never let Fuuma talk me into that date. I should have left ages ago, but I had you and I kept putting it off.”

There was a tightness in Fai’s throat that he couldn’t put a source to, it ached and made it difficult to breathe. All he wanted to do was hold on to Kurogane and curl up under the blankets and forget all about everything. He wanted to shut the world away and just exist with this man that he loved. The world could keep its monsters and jobs and everything else, so long as Fai could keep Kurogane.

“Bring me with you,” Fai said, as full of conviction has he could make it sound. He really didn’t have much going for him in this city to keep him, what he’d said last night had been the whole truth. 

He’d moved to this city because of his internship and hadn’t left because nothing had been promising enough to warrant him putting that much effort into relocating, not to mention that he hardly had the funds to live, let alone uproot himself entirely on his own.

“Take this job,” he continued. “We can move, I’ll find another job-”

“And what? Have you spend the rest of your life terrified of me?” Kurogane sounded bitter and Fai spared a thought towards if this sort of thing had ever happened to him before. “You’re not thinking about this,” he insisted. “You don’t even know what I am.”

“For the last time,” Fai ground out. “I’m not scared _of you_.”

Suddenly, Kurogane was on his feet, looming over Fai with his considerable bulk and height. A shock of fear ran through Fai, made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end and kicked his heart into high gear. He stumbled back a step or two, all the while keeping his eyes fixed on Kurogane.

He hated himself for reacting like that, because he wasn’t afraid of Kurogane, he loved Kurogane, but he was still reconciling the idea of the man he loved and a murderous monster being the same person. Still, Fai had a point to prove, because while there was an instinctual fear of the danger that Kurogane encapsulated it wasn’t Kurogane himself that had Fai’s nerves on edge.

Kurogane didn’t get the chance to comment on Fai’s reaction before Fai stepped back into his space, back straight and chest out, the set of his shoulders defiant. He stilled the shaking in his hands through sheer force of will and looked Kurogane dead in the eye. He would not be intimidated, let alone for some stupid reason like trying to force Fai out of Kurogane’s life. This was a battle of wills and he would not back down.

“Like I said last night, I don’t care _what_ you are,” Fai said, and this time it felt like he might even come to mean it some day. “But if that’s such a big deal, then tell me, so I do know.”

For several long seconds Kurogane didn’t move, didn’t even breathe, and then all of the fight seemed to drain completely out of Kurogane in one long, world weary sigh. He scrubbed a hand over his face and through his hair before eyeing Fai again and nodding to the door. “Not without coffee first.”

It was all so normal, easy to slip into the morning routine they’d been through more times than Fai could count. They moved around each other, Kurogane pouring coffee into mugs, Fai digging out the sugar from where it’d been shoved behind various spices since he’d last used it and checking the date on his small carton of milk in the refrigerator. There was no awkward shuffling, no stepping on toes. It felt like they should be clumsier around each other, like for some reason the events of last night should have thrown them completely out of equilibrium, but there they were, almost as if nothing had changed.

Finally, sitting at the coffee table in Kurogane’s living room, things were less comfortable, less familiar. Fai didn’t curl into Kurogane’s side, Kurogane’s arm didn’t lift to wrap around Fai and pull him closer. There wasn’t some mindless movie on the television to act as background noise while Fai playfully kissed at whatever random parts of Kurogane his lips could reach without dislodging him from the warm embrace. Instead they had a heavy silence and an empty cushion between them, mugs of hot coffee clutched in their hands like life lines.

“So,” Fai began. “You wanna just start or should we hold a Q&A?” He sipped at his coffee and winced a little at the flavor -- too much sugar, not enough milk, Kurogane was using the cheap brand of coffee grounds, meaning he was behind on going grocery shopping and had run out of the good stuff.

He watched Kurogane take a pull of his own mug and frown at the remaining contents before taking another swallow. “There isn’t actually a name for what I am. It’s too-- it’s practically random, no way to keep track of who turns and where they go. Far as I know, most of us go our whole lives without meeting another like us.”

“What do you mean ‘turns’? Like a vampire?” When had Fai’s life become a trashy monster romance flick? (He knew _exactly_ when and one day he was going to kick Fuuma’s ass for this.)

Kurogane shrugged and drained the last of his coffee. He didn’t get up for a second cup, just leaned back on the couch and glared at the ceiling. “Yes and no. Let me start from the beginning.”

The story Kurogane told was not a pleasant one. His family had been victims of a robbery gone wrong. Living in a bad part of town it had been a risk, but his mother had been ill and his father’s two jobs could only do so much for the small family. They’d locked up as always, Kurogane could remember that so clearly, but the burglars had still gotten in. They’d shouted and threatened Kurogane and his family. They hit Kurogane’s father with the butt of their gun. After that, there wasn’t much Kurogane could remember very clearly.

He had seen blood and he remembered screaming and crying in his mother’s arms. He remembered looking into the barrel of a gun and the sound of a shot being fired. He didn’t remember attacking the burglars, he only remembered rage and a heart rending sadness. When the haze of his emotions finally cleared both of the would-be robbers lay dead at his feet and Kurogane had been absolutely covered in blood, the tiny pricks of claws and fangs only just beginning to sprout. His parents also had not survived the night, his father lost to the blow he’d taken to the head and his mother shot. Kurogane had run, scared of being taken by the police into custody and blamed for the murders. 

He had been all of five years old. 

Fai knew his mouth was hanging open in shock, but Kurogane’s tale wasn’t finished and Fai had no words besides.

Eventually, the authorities had caught up with Kurogane, someone recognizing him from missing child posters, but by then the damage had been done. Kurogane was a monster now, and he was so very alone. He had no idea what was happening to him, why he grew claws or why he had the incessant urge to push and shove and bite and scratch. It was written off as a traumatized child acting out when he pushed and fought with other children on the playground, he was considered for a behavioral disorder when he kept fighting with his foster parents. Prone to fits of rage, they had said.

Kurogane struck out on his own at sixteen, got himself a job and a GED and found himself a bar fight in back alleys every other week. By then he’d figured out that fighting was what the monster in him needed.

A year later he met another person like him, someone older and wiser. They helped him understand, told him things he needed to know but didn’t want to. Kurogane had not taken the news that he would have to kill well. He had lashed out at the person who had offered this information and had been soundly beaten. 

The mysterious mentor stuck around for a few months, answered which of Kurogane’s questions they could and helped him get on his feet. They helped Kurogane apply to college and scholarships, gave him tips on hiding his involvement in the murders and how to make his feedings seem erratic so that he wasn’t predictable. Kurogane was drilled and rehearsed in all manner of tricks. He took to it easier than he would have liked.

His first kill started as a stone in his stomach, burning cold and sickening. It ended in the closest thing to euphoria Kurogane had even known at that point of his life. 

After that, it was like nothing.

“You know the rest,” Kurogane shrugged. “Got my degree, moved around, met you.”

Fai’s mouth was still hanging open, the shock of it all stunning him into silence.

“When a little kid kills, something inside of them wakes up,” Kurogane continued, taking advantage of the fact that Fai didn’t seem able to interrupt him. “It’s instinctive and feeds on the violence that woke it. That’s why I have to kill, why I was always fighting when I was younger. I _have_ to, just as much as I have to eat or sleep.”

It took a few tries, swallowing around a lump in his throat and a thudding knot in his chest, but Fai managed to force the words out. “I- I had no idea. I’m-”

“I swear to god if you say you’re sorry,” Kurogane said warningly. He hadn’t looked at Fai the entire time he’d told his story, just kept staring up at the ceiling, eyes focused somewhere far away, seeing things that had come and gone.

Fai set his mug down, still half full of now cold coffee, and scooted closer to Kurogane. He gingerly pried the empty mug out of Kurogane’s hands and set it aside. “Then I don’t know what to say,” Fai admitted. There wasn’t really much to say to something like that, even without the added twist of monsters and transformations.

Finally, Kurogane turned to look at Fai. His face was set. “Well, now you know,” he said. “If I stop I die, this is my life. Do you really want it to be yours, too?”

It was a terrifying prospect, to live with a person and know that they killed, that they would never stop. The knowledge churned unpleasantly in Fai’s stomach and chilled his blood to ice. But Kurogane wasn’t killing these people for sport, and he wasn’t asking Fai to kill along with him. All Kurogane was asking for was Fai’s silence.

Kurogane’s lips were as warm as ever when Fai leaned over and kissed him. When Kurogane, after a few seconds of conflicted stillness, returned Fai’s kiss he knew.

He could do silence.


	7. First Flight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The dust begins to settle and Fai hopes to see a routine emerging.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure how long this fic will go on, but I think I finally have an _idea_ for a stopping point. It won't be super soon though so there's still plenty to come.

As soon as the door closed and the lock clicked into place Fai began pacing. An hour later found him fidgeting around in the kitchen, cleaning and organizing. After that he forced himself out into the living room and turned on the television, mindlessly flipping through channels until he found something that could keep his attention (an old, black and white movie with cowboys and gunfights and horrible special effects but an interesting plot). Time crawled by and Fai’s eyelids grew heavy and before he knew it he was sprawled out on the couch and jerking awake at the sound of the window closing.

There was some late night infomercial playing on the television and Kurogane and Sakura were standing in the living room staring at him with glowing eyes. Sakura, the darling child, actually looked concerned for him, while Kurogane only looked at Fai like he was an idiot. 

“The bed is right down the hall, you know,” Kurogane said before shooing Sakura into the bathroom to clean herself off. Fai had spotted a bit of blood on her jacket and face, but shadows were so good at hiding that sort of thing and the only light in the living room was from the television.

Fai righted himself with a huff. “I know. I didn’t mean to fall asleep out here I was just…” He ended on a shrug and let Kurogane fill in the blank. Fai had done this before, and he’d certainly end up doing it again.

“Things went fine,” Kurogane said, answering Fai’s unspoken question. “She didn’t even kill.”

Fai frowned. “Will that be enough?” Kurogane had told him that killing was the only way he could properly feed. He didn’t want Sakura starving herself.

“Yeah, she’s young still, she’ll be able to live off of fist fights and the like for a few years yet without worry. She shouldn’t have to actually kill until she’s a teenager, maybe even later.”

There was a snide comment about hormones and murder on the tip Fai’s tongue, but he swallowed the words and glanced back towards where he could hear the water running as Sakura cleaned herself up. They already knew she was a tough kid, she’d already made it through hell and, given some time, this new life would roll off her shoulders like water down her back. Fai managed to adjust to this life, Sakura was young, she’d have a much easier time.

Kurogane stepped close and yanked a bit on a few strands of Fai’s hair, enough to fully capture his attention. “Quit thinking so much.”

Half heartedly, Fai swatted Kurogane’s hand away, doing nothing to stop it from settling on his hip and drawing him closer. “I thought I needed to think _more_ ,” Fai said, the banter coming easily. “You’re always complaining about me being an airhead.”

“Think about important things, idiot,” Kurogane countered, leaning down so their noses were practically pressed together. “Think about useful things, things you can do.”

The smile that slowly curled Fai lips was natural and wicked, and the way Kurogane’s eyes darkened told him his intentions were heard loud and clear. “You mean things like _you_?”

Few things were as burningly attractive as the wolfish grin that came to Kurogane’s face, and it was going to be a grand night indeed each and every time Fai saw it. “That’s one thing, yeah.” Kurogane leaned down, his breath ghosting across Fai’s face as their lips brushed, a tease and a promise all at once, something familiar that sent shivers up Fai’s spine. It spoke volumes about how the stray bits of blood smeared on Kurogane’s face did nothing to deter Fai’s need to kiss him.

The couch was so achingly close and the bedroom seemed so, so far away. It would have been so easy to corral Kurogane back the handful of steps until he fell back onto the cushions. The night after Kurogane hunted they always took things slow. They made love gently, sweetly, pulling free gasps and pleas, plied each other with soft affection. It was like a balm to Fai’s frayed nerves and he needed it. 

“What should I do with- oh!” Sakura’s tiny voice was like a bucket of ice water on a flame and Fai’s amorous mood had been quickly drenched. Fai pulled away from Kurogane like he’d been electrocuted and spun to face Sakura, who was standing at the doorway, holding her jacket out at arm’s length. “I’m sorry!” she squeaked, her cheeks coloring cutely. “I’ll go wait in the bathroom!”

“No, Sakura-chan, it’s okay,” Fai said, taking quick steps to her side. He knelt down and smiled sweetly at her. “What did you need, dear?”

She didn’t speak for a few seconds, only looked between Kurogane, who had stepped up and knelt at Sakura’s other side, and Fai as if she were seeing them for the first time. When she finally did find her words, they were not an answer to Fai’s question. “Are you and Kurogane-san in love?”

Of all the things he might have expected Sakura to ask him, that had not even been on the list. He stuttered a bit through his shock along with Kurogane while Sakura waited for them to answer her with a patience no child her age should possess. 

Eventually, Fai managed to snap out of it and nodded. “Yeah, Kuro-tan and I are in love.”

As if that was news to either of them. It was love that had kept Fai in Kurogane’s life. It was love that had Fai keeping Kurogane’s secrets and love that had stilled Kurogane’s claws when Fai had stumbled upon the truth. It was no surprise or secret. 

“Like my mommy and daddy were?” Fai couldn’t tell if he was imagining the gentle hope in Sakura’s voice or not, but either way, he had a feeling that she was trying to seek out some sort of comfort that he didn’t quite understand. 

“Yeah,” Kurogane said, surprising Fai. “Just like your mom and dad. And we’re gonna look after you, just like they did.”

That seemed to be the right answer, because Sakura beamed up at the both of them and cheerily switched gears once more to ask about her jacket, which Kurogane took from her before shooing her off to bed and beginning his own clean up.

With a bit of ceremony and the promise of an inappropriately sweet (by Kurogane’s standards) breakfast, Sakura’s teeth were brushed and she was tucked securely in bed, little arms wrapped tightly around Kero. Fai double checked her nightlight and triple checked the window lock and only then did he flick off the light and close Sakura’s door, the little girl already snoring gently. 

Fai stood there for a few minutes, leaning against the wall and staring at her door like he could see through it. He wanted so badly for this little girl to grow up happy and loved. If he had had the power he would have brought her family back from the grave, would have fought tooth and nail with the grim reaper itself if it would have done a bit of good. 

He couldn’t bring them back, though. So he would have to do his best to provide Sakura with what they no longer could. 

“She’ll adjust,” Kurogane said from where he was watching Fai in the doorway to the bathroom. “Kids are tough.”

Kids did have a tendency to bounce right back after getting knocked down, but Fai didn’t yet know if Sakura’s newly less-than-human status would be a benefit or a hinderance. Especially since…

“You know, we’re going to have to start thinking about school for her,” Fai said.

With a gentle tug, Kurogane bid Fai to follow him to their bedroom, and Fai did without complaint. It didn’t, however, stop him from spilling all of his worries out as they walked. 

“She’s already going to be behind a year because of this mess. I don’t want her to fall too far behind,” Fai fretted. “It’s going to be hard enough for her to acclimate as it is without her being two or three years older than her classmates.”

“I think we should home school her,” Kurogane said. “She’s still new to this, if she gets too excited and her fangs or claws come out while she’s in class it’s going to be a lot of trouble.”

Fai hadn’t thought of that, in fact, he’d hardly thought at all about what they’d need to do to keep Sakura’s secret safe. For a child so young, control didn’t come easy under normal circumstances. He felt like she ought to be around her peers, was convinced it would do her good, but Kurogane had a very valid point, until she could control her new characteristics she would need to be supervised heavily. 

There must have been something in Fai’s expression because Kurogane tapped a knuckle against his forehead. “Control will come with time,” he said, flicking on their bedroom lights. “A few years of homeschooling won’t turn her into a hermit.”

In a show of great maturity, Fai stuck his tongue out at Kurogane. “I just want things to be as easy as they can be for her.”

“Easy isn’t really an option anymore,” Kurogane sighed. “Give it a few years, she ought to have enough control over herself to enter the school system proper. Until then, if you’re so worried, take her down to the park. There are always kids there.”

Fai wasn’t exactly sure how much better a day at the park would be than a school day, but at least at a park he’d be able to keep an eye on her. He should also be qualified enough to help her with school work for a few years yet, he did have a college degree after all. 

“Take her tomorrow, while she’s still satisfied from her hunt,” Kurogane said, stripping off his shirt and tossing it in a waiting plastic bag to be thoroughly washed tomorrow. His pants and socks quickly followed suit and then there he was, standing in all his glory where Fai was welcome to look and touch to his heart’s content. 

He hummed distractedly, letting Kurogane know that Fai at least knew he’d said something, even if he was absolutely distracted from what it had been. Kurogane kept speaking while he rummaged around in the dresser drawer for some sleep clothes, but Fai had other plans as he stepped up behind Kurogane and started dropping sweet kisses up his spine and across the broad expanse of his shoulders. Plans that did not require boxers or anything like them.

Fai stepped up behind Kurogane and started dropping sweet kisses up his spine and across the broad expanse of his shoulders. 

\-- -- 

Merrily, Sakura skipped alongside Fai, her tiny hand in his, as she babbled on about what she wanted to do once they got to the park.

“And then I wanna go down the slide a _whole bunch_!” she exclaimed. “And, and, and then can you push me on the swings? Please? Can you?”

Fai chuckled and smiled down at her. “Of course, as much as you’d like.”

“Yippie!!” Sakura cheered. 

In the weeks that Sakura had been living with them he didn’t think he’d ever seen her so energetic and carefree, even after what she and Kurogane had been up to the night before. Fai carefully did not frown as he thought that a good meal always did put people in a better mood. 

“Remember, we have to make a quick stop first,” Fai said pushing open the door to the cafe he once worked at. The bell above the door jingled and before he even called out Hokuto was popping her head up from behind the counter.

“Fai-chan!” she beamed, and then she caught sight of Sakura. “And this must be the little darling you’ve left me for!”

Laughing, Fai patted Sakura’s head. “This is Sakura-chan,” he said before kneeling down. “Sakura-chan, this is Hokuto-san, she’s a good friend of mine. We used to work together.”

Hokuto followed Fai’s lead and knelt down to Sakura’s level and held out her hand. “Nice to meet you, Sakura-chan,” she said.

Pink-cheeked and looking a bit flustered, Sakura nodded and waved hello as she scooted herself behind Fai. He hadn’t expected her to be the shy sort, but he did have to admit it was adorable. He gave Hokuto a shrug and she gave him a wink as she stood up and headed back behind the counter. Before he could ask her what she was doing she was coming back to the holding what looked like a huge lollipop.

“Here, Sakura-chan, you can have one of our very first cake pops!” Hokuto offered Sakura the treat. Sakura looked up at Fai and when he nodded his permission she smiled and took the sweet from Hokuto with a tiny thank you.

Obviously pleased with herself, Hokuto started chatting. “We just got those in last night. They’re a pain to make, but they’re so good!” she said. “I’m guessing you’re here for your last paycheck? It took you long enough.”

Like the mature adult he was, Fai stuck his tongue out at her. “Sorry, I’ve been a little busy lately.”

Hokuto just laughed as she unlocked the drawer the paychecks were kept in. “Yeah, yeah,” she said. “You ever gonna tell me that whole story about how you became a dad?”

“Dunno,” Fai said, stuffing his paycheck into his pocket for later. “How willing are you to babysit?”

He was only partly joking. He loved Sakura and was happy to have her around and in his and Kurogane’s lives, but he would like to have some guaranteed time alone with his lover.

Hokuto glanced over at Sakura, who was carefully eating the cake pop, trying her best to not get any crumbs on the floor. “That angel? I would never babysit her,” she joked, rolling her eyes.

Fai reached over and hugged her. “I promise we’ll find some time to catch up! You’re my favorite ever!”

“You’re a filthy liar, Flourite,” Hokuto laughed as she returned his embrace. “I might have believed I was your only girl before, but I know when I’ve been replaced!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I probably will include a bonus chapter of Hokuto babysitting Sakura at some point just because I really want to and no one can stop me.


End file.
